TSRB 149 - Automatic Episode Transcript - Please excuse any errors, not reviewed for accuracy

Benedikt:  a network means that these are two way relationships. It's not that you are going out there trying to get things from people, but you have to be an active part of some sort of community and actually help people and bring value to the, community because, that's the only way it works.Right?

This is the Self Recording Band podcast, the show where we help you make exciting records on your own, wherever you are. D i y style, let's.

Benedikt: Hello and welcome to the Self Recording Band podcast. I'm your host Benedict, if you are new to the show. Thank you. Welcome. Uh, Thank you for joining us. Thank you for listening. I hope the show will help you transform your mixes and recordings because this is what we set out to do. If you are Already a listener. And if you're coming back, thank you for coming back and we would really appreciate it if you g go to Apple Podcast or your favorite podcast platform, wherever you listen to the show, and you'll leave us a review there if you've got any value out of these past episodes. And if you are on social media, [00:01:00] Instagram, Facebook, anything like that, please share the episode, make a screenshot, post it there, tag us, and also leave us a question in this post, because if we see that, if you tag us and we see that we are more than happy to answer your question on the. And give a shout out to your band or you as an artist. So just make a screenshot and share that in your stories. And yeah, thank you for that already. This will help by the way. This is not just because we love to see these and answer your questions, but this really helps us reach more people like you and yeah, help even more people make better recordings. Now, one more thing before we get into this episode. We have a free mixing guide out there that is pretty new. As of the recording of this episode, it's called Standout Mixes. The DIY Musicians Guide to exciting mis mixes that stand out and connect. And if you want that, you can go to the self recording band.com/standout mixes. It's completely free. It's an in-depth video tutorial plus a checklist that you can go through and it teaches you what really matters when it comes to mixing, like the essentials, the stuff that pros never skip. And, but so many people completely ignore. And I promise you, if you follow these [00:02:00] things, you can do it completely in your do no external plugins needed, nothing fancy. You can do it with what you already have. If you follow these things in this, the steps in this checklist that the things I show in the video, your mixes will. Like instantly better, instantly. Because this is stuff that really, really, really matters if you want your mixes to connect, and nobody's really doing that. So that's why it's called standout mixes, because it hopefully will, your mixes will make your mixes stand out. So the surf recording band.com/standout mixes, go grab that for free. Now onto today's episode. I, as always, I'm here with my friend and co-host Malcolm Owen Flat. Hello, Malcolm. How are you?

Malcom: Hey Benny. I'm great, man. How are you?

Benedikt: I'm grade two. Despite the fact that I, I don't know what I've done this night, but I can't, I can barely move and breathe because my back

Malcom: Oh

Benedikt: crazy. So something, something went wrong like some, a truck or something hit me this night. I dunno.

Malcom: Oh, geez, geez. Well, you got a, a long day of sitting in a chair because we are doing our little community [00:03:00] mixes. Unpacked q and a meet up after this in a little bit. I know. So I'm very excited for that. Listeners, we're also approaching our hundred and 50th episode. This is our hundred 49th. I think that we're recording right now. Super excited. So if you are enjoying the. Do what Benny said. Leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and ask us a question on Instagram. It'd be sweet to answer a bunch of questions for a hundred 50th episode. Actually, that'd be really cool, except for by the time this comes out. That episode will have already been recorded.It's not gonna work

Benedikt: Nope. Pro, probably not

Malcom: but we'll still answer those questions.

Benedikt: We're happy to answer them on the 151st or second. You know, let's start, let's start the new year with like a bunch of questions from you guys. That would be sweet. Yeah, totally. It's ki it's wild that we are approaching like one 50. That's, that's pretty cool.Like,yeah, the fact, I, I wasn't really sure if, if, if we should share that or not. Like some, the streaming numbers that we have and stuff, because it's likely, like, it's, it's pretty irrelevant and, and also really hard to track accurately. But I, I still, I think we should say [00:04:00] that Or I just wanna say that it's not only the 150th episode, but we also crossed 50,000 downloads, like individual downloads for this podcast. And I just wanna say that because it doesn't sound like a lot for a podcast that's been out there for solo, but A, you can't really track it super accurately. Accurately. And b, I think 50,000 individual downloads is actually pretty wild, like thinking that we've been talking to. A stadium full of people basically.You know, like, like if you do, if you would, if you

Malcom: time, it's like half an hour to an hour long episodes. That's like it's many, many hours of people listening to tips on how to record. It's so cool.

Benedikt: yeah, exactly. It's, it's wild really. If you would try to do that in the real world it would be close to impossible to pull that off. But it's, thanks to podcasting and internet, it's possible. And it's, it's yeah, it's kind of crazy. And, and, and I. Yeah, I'm just grateful to have that opportunity and, and not only are people listening, but they are engaging, they are following our advice. We constantly get messages or [00:05:00] shares and posts where we see that people actually do what we teach and that they love it and that it leads to results. So, yeah. Thank you for being a listener. Thank you for another year of this and we hope we. We will continue that for a long time and, and we will constantly improve the episodes and that's also why we need your questions, by the way, and your feedback, because we need to know what you like, what you wanna know, what you're still missing so that we can improve. That's why, why the engagement is also important. And then of course, as I said, we wanna reach even more people like you and really transform the DIY recording scene sort of.

Malcom: I've got one more request for our listeners. When you reach out to us with your questions, let us know where you're from. I like, that's my favorite thing, is finding out that somebody in a place I've never been to is listening. I just can't get over that. I love it the most. . So let us know where you're where, where you're calling in from, and that, that's just fun for me to see, like how the self recording band community is spread around the.

Benedikt: Oh yeah, absolutely. Yeah, and, and I know that it's from everywhere just because the small amount of people that I have in my coaching program, the [00:06:00] ones that I work with, one-on-one on a regular basis, they are from Australia, the us, Canada, Europe, like from everywhere. And that's just a small part of our audience. So really curious to hear where you all are from and cool. All right. So, yeah, tonight is the meetup. I, I think it doesn't, it's not really worth talking about that because it's already, you know,

happened

Malcom: gone. But the, there's a perfect segue. We've been talking about where y'all from and our audience and, and the, and the community of listeners we have, and that we're doing a q and a with our community. And specifically the, the people that picked up our mixes unpacked course a while back which I think maybe is gonna be available again soon. I don't, Benny, you're the pro on that. The segue is that we're talking about why you need to leave your studio, and and your comfort zone on a regular basis and build community with real people. And, you know, that makes it sound like it has to be in person. It doesn't actually have to be in person, but the community and networking is, is really what we're gonna be talking about [00:07:00] today. It's so. Ben Benny and I want to connect with our listeners more. And so that's why we're asking you to contact us on Instagram and stuff like that and get on the Facebook community. But this is about you, our listeners, connecting with, you know, it could be either listeners, because you're all in bands, you're all musicians. It's actually the perfect people to be connecting with, but also people in your local music scenes and in your, you know, recording scenes, all of that. We, we want you to expand. Your connections out, and we're gonna talk about the benefits of why that's important today.

Benedikt: Absolutely. Totally. So we think that together is better and that you should leave your studio every once in a while and it can be hard because that also means leaving your comfort zone. Many of us are introverts, as creatives. It you can do almost. Everything from home alone, you know, but we still think you should leave your studio from time to time, can start online, build connections online, but at some point in person is even better. But then either way, just be part of a community. And in this episode we're gonna explain why we think that is a great idea and why we'll help you [00:08:00] improve your skills even faster. And it's not just because of your skills and your music. It's, it's like, it's just fun and it's like, I think it's better for your life in general.

honestly. So, The thing is, a lot of us are cave dwellers, right? We are studio like Lone Studio Wolves, always figuring things out on our own and to, you know, we are, as I said, we are often introverts and I know that because I've talked to so many people one-on-one. I know that a lot of people are kind of uncomfortable reaching out to strangers or going to meetups, going to, well, like, even if they go to shows, it's hard for them to walk up to someone and start a conversation, especially if they're strangers. So that's, that's really hard for a lot of people. And in our world, it seems to yeah, there seems to be a, a big, a big percentage of the people here seem to have that problem. I don't know why that is, but a lot of creatives have that. And it's, it's totally fine, but there's ways to overcome it too. And I think you, you'll benefit from that. And, you know, when I think that both Malcolm and I. I, I can't say I was a, like much of an introvert or, I, I, I mean, I've been always, I've always [00:09:00] been on tour with my bands and been two, two shows and stuff like that. But still, I think once I started actively seeking community, reaching out to people, building relationships, I think that has done a lot for me, my career and the way I produce music and all that. And I think Malcolm, for you, it's the same. So we also wanna share our stories and how it helped us and what we did and what we still do to Yeah, to nurture these relationships, to build new relationships and, and all these things because. , even though I'm not particularly an introvert or it doesn't really feel hard to me, I still sometimes have to make myself go somewhere. Like I sometimes don't feel like going somewhere to a meetup or to a show or party or whatever. Sometimes it's just easier and more comfortable to stay home with the family or just watch Netflix or whatever in the evenings or just tweak the mix for an hour more or something. And but every single time, almost really, almost every single time, Went out even though I didn't feel like it. And I still go, like when I, every single time I, I went there it was worth it almost every single time. I can't remember a single time where I, where it was [00:10:00] like I should have stayed home. That almost never happens. It's always, I'm always glad I went. And, you know, there's different things that happen. Opportunities can show up out of nowhere seemingly you know, Sometimes it starts with a small conversation, but that turns into long-lasting relationships. Collaborations can happen. Sometimes your skills improve all of a sudden just because you get some valuable insight or tip from somebody. You never know. Something happens and sometimes nothing happens that day. But over time, you know, things seemingly out of nowhere start to appear. And that is because you went out and met people. And this is when what we wanna talk about, I think.

Malcom: Absolutely. I would like to tell kind of a long story

Benedikt: Yeah, go

Malcom: a, it's a podcast. We're allowed to, I think , this is the exact format we're meant to do that. So as some of our listeners will know, I had a band called Band of Rascals, and that was like my primary focus for many years of my life. We, we had a really good run and I got to go on a lot of, big tours, and it, it was awesome. But I am definitely an introvert, , but I am an introvert that knows that it's [00:11:00] really important to be extroverted. What kind of, I don't wanna say as much as you can be. But for me it feels like as much as I can be

Benedikt: Yeah.

Malcom: So the, like, there's so many stories I could tell, like, like how networking and getting out in person led to us getting our management, which was changed everything. But the story I want to tell because it happened most recently. Is about a, a radio station in the closest city to where I live, Victoria, BC Canada called the Zone 91 13, the Zone. They're a great modern rock radio station. We are a modern rock band and for. Ever since I've wanted to be a band, they've been doing a band of the month program essentially where they feature a local artist once a month for throughout the year. And we had our band starting out, band Rascals, you know, years ago. This was like 2013 or 2014 or something, I think. And we wanted to get on the radio of course. So we were applying for this and we ended up getting. Oh, I'm, I'm obviously skipping a [00:12:00] lot of details. We got it in like 2015, I think. And if there's like, there's probably two things I can equate to all the success we had. Like there was getting that radio spot and then there was getting our manager and both. Did come from networking. Make no mistake. I mean, we had to have music that they liked and an audience and stuff like that, but they knew our names. When both those things happened, we weren't just like, they didn't just stumble across our music and say, yes, we're choosing you. We, we were on first name basis with the people that we connected with, so networking was involved there. Okay. Continuing to skip forward. Just like a month ago now, the same radio station reached out to me and said, Hey, we're doing a meetup, community meetup in Victoria where local bands can come out and ask us questions about how to get on the radio with this same program that your band got back in 2015. And they asked me if I would like to be a panelist. So I said, hell yes. That'd be really exciting. I would love to. So I got to go and talk to people about how much it changed [00:13:00] my life, cuz that really launched our radio. Life they like, they were a huge part of like our, they were our springboard for radio play. And then also just like, you know, strategies for approaching them to get it on there. And there was people asking recording questions. It was great. But what I noticed more than anything was, I mean, the room was full, but there was a lot of people there. I'm very in the scene, so I know most of the players. There was a lot of people that talked the talk that were not. And they talk about how they're gonna get on the radio this year. They got this new single that's gonna be unstoppable, whatever. They just gotta record it. They, they're all talk and they weren't at this event where the radio literally invited them to come meet them in person. and ask questions about how to get on the radio. And it just blew my mind. It's like, , how could you miss that opportunity? And I mean, there, there was a lot of people not there that fall into that category of talkers. To me, it, it really was like, wow, you couldn't come to this one thing. It like, it [00:14:00] was so important. And it was like I could see all these connections happening from the other people that did show up where. Oh, and actually I could already point to it, there's a concert happening this month that I think all three of the bands on the bill were at that event. It's like little teamworks teams just like were built at this one event, and I know they're all gonna be on the radio next year.

Benedikt: Yeah,

Malcom: I, it's, it's like it's all clearly laid out in front of me now. It's like they showed up, they met the people, they're good, and now they're playing a show together. They're building an audience. These three bands will be on the. Next year where the people that did not show up, it's gonna be a harder go

the

Benedikt: 100%.

Malcom: so like that is, you know it, I'm sure all of those musicians would've rather have been in their little cave making music, but they showed up there and it was probably for at least a couple people in that room, it's gonna be a night that they're gonna remember for the rest of their life. And when they look back at [00:15:00] the success, their band's gonna have this coming.

Benedikt: 100%. 100%. And yeah, as you said, it's wild that people wouldn't use an opportunity like that. Right. But it's also not rare for some reason. Like the stories like these are actually pretty common and it's, I don't know why that is. It's the same with like, when, I mean, we don't have a huge audience, but when we offer something like a meetup or when I ask people to leave questions when after they've watched a course or something like that, only a fraction of those people will, will do that every single time. And that's totally normal. That's like, it's like that in every single program, and it's completely for free, right? It's, it's just requires you to actually leave your questions there and then I will, we will answer them or actually show up to that free meetup or that call, and then you get your questions answered. And, and I, I just don't get why you wouldn't use that or why you wouldn't. And with a meetup like that where literally what you say you want to achieve, like the people who can help you do that are there and you can, you know, why wouldn't you be there? Like, it's,

Malcom: yeah. badness,

Benedikt: Absolutely.

Malcom: and, and I'm, I'm sure some people, you know, had to work [00:16:00] or whatever, but I know that a lot of people just didn't go. Because I don't know, like I, I, I really don't know. You just gotta, you gotta go to those things. So like, I guess that's really gonna be the point we're driving home is like, look for these kind of things because they can lead to a amazing changes in your life, in your career. Benny and I. Met in an education platform community. So Benny and I are both huge, like huge into investing in our own skill sets. And we, I can't remember which one it was, honestly, that we met in Benny, but we, we did, we met in a Facebook community. And then we started a mastermind group from there, which is something we're gonna talk about.

And then we eventually started this podcast as a result of that we've never met in person, but I spend more time with Benny than I. Anybody other than my fiance,

Benedikt: Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's true. It's absolutely true and I think it started by, it started in some community, but it also really started with you reaching out to me. You sent me a Facebook message, I think, or something, [00:17:00] which also is something that a lot of people, Yeah. It's hard for some people to do that, but you just did it. You reached out to me, you asked something, I replied, and then, you know, started from there and we had no idea what will come from that. You know, nobody like it would, nobody knew that we're gonna do a podcast together and all these, these things, but it like just developed. It happened and and yeah. So, and it all started in some, in, in a Facebook group. Yeah, for sure. You know, and then the, I just wanna say though, , it is not your fault if you don't do that right now, because you might be, I don't know how you've been brought up or what happened or why you are an introvert and stuff, so I would, I I'm just saying that because for the longest time, like the first couple of years of my career, I didn't do any of that too. I had didn't have a mastermind. I didn't go to meetups. I didn't do, I wasn't part of like educational communities, so I know what it's like to. Be a person who doesn't do that. But you can't change you. You know, if somebody tells you that it is a good idea like we do now you can't change. It's not your fault that you're not already doing it, but you can make a decision to do it [00:18:00] from now on because we, we really think it helps and it will help you and it doesn't cost you anything other than like getting out of your comfort zone. And to give you an example how that changed for me, for example, I didn't do anything at first. Then I started I think it's, for me, it started with, yeah, some of the educational platforms that I joined. The first time I paid for like education and that was true. I did that in the mixing and in recording world. I paid for the education there, but then also I got, A business course that Malcolm got two. So we educated ourselves on how to actually run a business because I've been running one for years, but it wasn't really working because I didn't take that part serious and didn't know that I had to. And so I was basically working all the time, but also broke all the time and I wanted to change that. So I educated myself in that regard and and. in that business coaching community, sort of, there was other mixing engineers and producers. It was specifically made for people like us. And then in there we built mastermind groups where we helped each other out. We shared up like struggles and we gave each other advice. And so new [00:19:00] communities and, and like new relationships were formed there. And then it all started with. . It was a matter of like a couple of months where I started all these different programs and within a year of doing that, or a year and a half of doing that, mind you, like before that I never, I've never done anything like it. I've not been part of a community. I've never done anything, and within a year or a year and a half of doing that, I saw the benefit of it. Of it and was, it was so. So huge that I decided to do things like fly to the US to Orlando, to a meetup there. Pay like three grand or something total for the whole trip, just to be there for five day, four days or something, three or four days with other engineers. Be there an in-person meetup. That was not cheap at all, and that required me to fly across the Atlantic and back. But I knew that it's gonna be worth it because I'm gonna meet people there. I'm there was, there were amazing speakers there that I could learn from. I've, I've built new relationships or I've nurtured existing relationships by meeting those people in person. So from doing nothing in that regard to spending a couple thousand euros to go to a meetup in [00:20:00] person on the other side of the planet a lot. Changed for me right in that short amount of time. And I've never stopped doing these things since I, I'm still in a mastermind. We we're meeting yeah, every single week for the past , four or five years. I still reach out to people. I still join new communities. So it's something I will hopefully always do because it's, it's really paid

Malcom: Yeah, it was totally I know that one of your Mastermind members has been on the podcast as well, so like it's another like point of collaboration of how these things can spread out and. And just really like the people, you know, dictate how your life turns out in a way.

Benedikt: Yes.

Malcom: it, you know, you're, it, yeah. It's, it's so valuable. I got asked recently from a band I know, like, we're a recording podcast and this topic's a little broader than that, so I hope everybody's still enjoying it. But I got asked recently, like, oh, how do I get a manager? I was like, oh, do you know a manager? And they're like, no. I am shrugging at the camera if you are listening, because it's like [00:21:00] you, well, you have to know one

Benedikt: Yeah. Yeah.

Malcom: if you, and, and, and just because you know one doesn't mean they're gonna manage you either, but like, you can't, you know, and, and say that that goes for everything. Like I want a record label. Do you know somebody that works at a record label? That's gonna help a lot, a huge amount. , do you wanna get played at a radio station? If you know somebody at that radio station, it's a huge perk. And this goes beyond that as well. Like if you go to a meetup with a bunch of musicians in your, you're scene, you're going to end up making contacts that know people at different venues that maybe have some recording space. Maybe you don't have a place to do drums and that person does you know, there's all of these things people can, you know, trade gear among, or like, you know, like shared gear, whatever, to make things happen. That's how you're gonna find jam spaces. If you're in a city where it's hard to find a jam space, you're gonna meet other bands that have jam spaces. Maybe you can do a share kind of thing. There's no limit to the perks that come from having a network.

Benedikt: Yes. And a network means, that these are two way relationships. It's not that you are going out [00:22:00] there trying to get things from people, but you have to be an active part of some sort of community and actually help people and bring value to the, community because that's the only way it works. Right? And you don't do it because you want to get something out of it. But you'll get something out of it automatically by just being there, having those conversations, being good to people, being kind. And then it will come eventually, automatically you, you don't go in there expecting something, you know, it just happens. Just be a good person like you would do with other relationships in your life too, hopefully. And So, yeah. And the, the, the whole, to bring it back to like musicians, as you said, it's not only about I mean, my example was about being a producer and, and, and doing something for your career, but also as a musician. I just started, or I'm, I'm part of a new band for a year now. I've, I've talked, I've been talking about that on the podcast too, and it was kind of, Crazy to see what happens there. What happened there? So we were a completely new band. Nobody knew we existed. Like it's like completely fresh start, basically. And we just, you know, we had a bunch of songs and we recorded them and we didn't play any shows. We didn't, we didn't do anything really [00:23:00] other than plan the band, get some songs out and, and just get, get started basically for a couple of months or almost a year. And then all of a sudden somebody reached out to me and said, Hey, I booked a show for you, I think it was seven, eight years ago. I don't know, with my other band. Back in the day, we were like touring diy. We played small shows, 10, 20 people sometimes. We, we drove across Europe in a van. We paid for that tour basically because we got so little money on each show, show that we, we, we paid whatever was left. Like it wasn't even enough to cover gas and van rent and all of that. So for a while we did that just to be in the scene, just to play shows, just to meet people, just to have a good time. And so we did that for a. And over time it got better. And of course our show chosen tours got better, but we did that in the beginning. And now with this new band, one person reached out and said, Hey, I booked a show for you, I dunno, eight years ago or something. And I just heard that you have a new band. I was already surprised by that, that this guy still was following me and knew that I had a new band. But then also turns out he runs a DIY sort of record label [00:24:00] in the hardcore punk scene in Germany, and he now, , like, he's releasing our record now, our upcoming record on vinyl. And the label is, you know, they're doing that for us. So we now have a record deal with a small label even two, like they collaborate with another label, so there's another community collaboration thing going on. So now we have two record labels out of nowhere who approached us and want to bring, want to release our record because they like these songs and, and I'm sure. They, I'm pretty sure he wouldn't have reached out if there wouldn't have been this personal connection, like the, the fact that he liked the songs. I'm sure that wouldn't have been enough for him to invest in us and, and release that record. I'm sure it was because we already knew each other and he liked my old band and there was this existing connection and so, you know, sometimes years later things like that can happen.

Malcom: Yeah, yeah, totally. That, that, that's exactly the point. It. It's actually important. I think it's never right away, ,

when you meet somebody, it's not like, hi, my name's so-and-so, I'm gonna change your life.

Benedikt: Yeah.

Malcom: it, it's, it's [00:25:00] never like that yeah.

Yeah. . exactly. Yeah. That's a warning. That's a big red flag. Get outta there,

Benedikt: Yeah.

Malcom: Wash your hands. But it, it. Like, it, it, it does take time to, to build a real relationship, but meeting them is the, the first step of course. Yeah, so we've talked about like masterminds shows Facebook groups like Benny and I met in, and please do go join the self recording band community on Facebook if you haven't already. That's a no-brainer. Parties and shows like concerts and stuff. You're gonna meet people there. Bands go to bands shows. That just seems to be a universal law. So

Benedikt: Yeah.

Malcom: You'll, you'll meet people in your network there, I'm sure, but

Benedikt: And if you go to shows, sorry. Sorry to cut you off, Malcolm. I just wanna say something about the shows. If you go to shows, don't just be there, because I've made that mistake too. I've been going to, I don't know how many shows for years without ever approaching anybody. Like I was just there watching the show and then I went home. But if you go to shows, just if you like the band and if they're approachable, just, you know, tell them that you like, Just start a conversation, a genuine, [00:26:00] honest conversation. Just tell 'em that you like the show or walk up to the owner of the venue and, and start a conversation or, you know, take, just connect with somebody in there. It's not hard and most people are, most people are not mean. So you can't, you can't just say something to someone even though it feels hard at the beginning, but try to do that because I've missed a lot of opportunities when I was too shy to do that. So.

Malcom: Yeah. Yeah, that's a, that's definitely, again, the hard part, especially if you're introverted, is taking that step. Try to and if there's no Facebook community for your scene, like most cities will have some kind of like, you know, so-and-so city music scene, Facebook group. That's a good thing to be a part of, of course. And, and you know, you're probably. Hopefully somebody will start like a meetup based on that. Once the size is the, the group is a certain size, so even just seeing people's kind of names and profile pictures floating around eventually leads to connections and lets you keep a pulse on, on your scene as well, which is really helpful I

Benedikt: Yeah. And you can start something like that. You can be the one [00:27:00] starting a local Facebook group or a local, local in-person meetup thing or host a party or whatever. You can come up with creative things and then it's not so hard for you to start conversations because if you start something like that, and you can do it online without even having to talk to somebody. But if you start it and people come, actually come to the event that you've planned. They will already know who you are and it's gonna be much easier to start conversations, right? So sometimes it might even be easier for you to be the host of something like that than to be, than to attend something and then walk up to whoever does it. So if there's nothing in your area, maybe you can become sort of the hub who knows everybody and who, who, who organizes these things, right?

Malcom: Told it. That's why I do a podcast,

Benedikt: yeah.

Malcom: It's people come up knowing who I am and I have to figure out who they are. But like they, they started a conversation with me. It's perfect

Benedikt: Exactly. Exactly.

Malcom: And, and yeah, you can, you can DM people on Facebook as well or whatever. Social media platform and build connections that way. If you want to, you can be helpful as well. Of course. Well, I mean, making a group is helpful, but like I've seen people make music [00:28:00] scene like Spotify playlists, you know, so it's just bands from the scene. That's a great way to just kind of like create something of value. But also it's gonna start conversations. People will be thankful that you did that.

Benedikt: Yeah, totally. And and I think we should say, why would you wanna do all these things? If this is a self recruiting band podcast, and not like a business podcast or something, I think. . First of all, as like most bands wanna, you know, wanna achieve something. Most bands wanna reach more people wanna get bigger, wanna be known. You know, that's one thing. But the other thing is there are a lot of self recording artists out there these days. Like in almost every band there is at least one person who knows how to operate a doll, or at least they do their own demos or something. So if you, if, if it, if for you, the only thing that you wanna do is get better at making records, then. Still at a show or at these community meetups or wherever, like you will meet other people who do that too. So that like, you know, they are almost everywhere, like in every band and. and you can go to specific, like recording related meetups or Facebook groups. It doesn't have to be like, you know, if there's no band for you that you wanna grow, if you are a solo artist [00:29:00] and just doing it from home, then be a part of a recording community or whatever. But just know that whatever your goal is, whatever you wanna get better at other people can help you get there faster. Always. So that this is why, why this is, I think why we wanna make this episode. Yeah.

Malcom: It, it told the, told the.

Benedikt: Yeah. Okay. Go ahead.

Malcom: Well, I was just gonna say that this kind of does, I mean, we're, we're trying to avoid talking about it because by the time you hear this, it'll be over. But the q and a we're doing in a few hours is, is a prime example of a, a budding community where . In this case, it's a course that people have paid for, but it comes with the bonus of having, you know, a community aspect where we're doing this meetup and people could meet each other in that forum. And, and Benny's coaching clients, I'm sure are always interacting with each other in. In that community as well. So paid communities are totally a thing as well. And there's, there's perks to a paid community. You are invested in it and more likely to take the step of starting a conversation [00:30:00] because you actually feel like you need to make sure you get what you paid for out of it. Not everybody works that way, but I definitely do. So again, Benny and I met in a very expensive paid community. Actually, that was like one of the most. Course I've ever bought, I think, but by far the most beneficial course I've ever taken as well.

Benedikt: Yes, absolutely. And, and the numbers prove that. So if I look at my numbers, because the, the coaching program that I have to self recording syndicate is not cheap. It's a one-on-one coaching program. With a group coaching element. It goes on for a, like a over a month. So it's not something that is like, something like an online course that you buy and go through real quick and then forget about it, but it's like a, it really gets you results. And it really requires my personal attention. So that's why it can't be cheap, of course. And because it's not cheap. There are not tons of people in there. Like currently, I think I have 17 or 18 students in there. If I would have, if I would run a free community of 17 or 18 people and I would offer weekly group coaching calls, nobody would show up or like one or two people would show up. Nobody probably. And, but for, with my [00:31:00] paid coaching people, at least like 5, 6, 7, 8, you know, whoever has time, people have to work sometimes. And we have different slots, so not everybody shows up all the time. But some people, a handful of people always shows up despite it being such a small community. And that is because they pay for it and. If you pay, you pay attention. That's the saying. And it's true because you want to get something out of it and you're invested in it. And as a result, people see results, right? It works. Versus, you know, watching countless hours of free YouTube stuff very rarely gets some, someone somewhere. I mean, it gets you somewhere, but, Not, not as far as like the other stuff. And so doesn't, doesn't mean you have to spend a lot of money now on a pay community, but I'm just saying for us, this started this whole thing being in paid communities, and it might be the kick in the pants that you need to, but just know that you don't need that if you, if you understand the value of a community. You can make yourself go to free stuff too. Like you have already have access to that, and you can start with that. If you, for whatever reason can't make yourself do that, then you probably need a paid community. And there's other benefits to being in a paid community, but I'm just saying [00:32:00] there's lot, lots of free opportunities out there that you only have to take. And yeah, so, so yeah, there's other things like. What else is there? Like trade trails? I just put it on the list there because sometimes depending on what you're doing there is like, I don't know what about the US or Canada, but there is like some. Something like, what is it over there? What's it, I forget the name. Nam Nam Show. Something like that. You know, stuff like that. I don't know how likely it is that you run into someone there and build relationships depending on what type of person you are, it's the same thing. You probably need to walk up to someone and make connections. There's similar stuff here in Germany too. I just put it there because if you like going there anyways be, I just know that some musicians like to go there to check out guitars and like the nerdy stuff and a lot of introverts go there. Not to build relationships, but just to check out the gear, but. , if you're already there because you like the gear or whatever, you could also as well use that to build relationships because you are in a spot with hundreds, if not thousands of other musicians, right? So don't just go there to check out the latest guitar gear or, or recording gear, but [00:33:00] actually try to to find interesting people and talk to them.

Malcom: Yeah, absolutely. There's certain, yeah, I, I keep going business mode here,

Benedikt: Yeah.

Malcom: that's where my, this, my, my brain just clicks into that. But there's like also certain music festivals in, usually in most countries, I think where it's it's like, A music festival. There's concerts, but it's also very industry based. You know, there's like South by Southwest, there's Canadian Music Week up here in Toronto. There, there's things like that where, yeah, you can just go and watch music, but there's also like panels and speakers and stuff like that and, and mingler and you just go and you're going to make connections if you put yourself out there. And that is where the, the type of people that are hard to meet are actually all in one place for once

Benedikt: Yeah.

Malcom: really, really good.

Benedikt: Yeah, abso absolutely. They, exactly, that's the one that's, that's why everybody goes to Nam and, and like these things, so, yeah. Totally. . What you might want what you might be asking yourself now is, why would I want to meet other musicians? I wanna reach an audience like, why other musicians? And this is not, you know, that doesn't do anything for [00:34:00] my band. Again, you can educate each other and give each other tips and advice and and so on and so forth, but also, I think that if you are trying to get better shows if you are trying to get on playlists or whatever other musicians, other artists that you can partner with, can do a lot for you. That's why, why I say it's worth doing that. I've seen a lot of Great collaborations that where like one band, as you said, Malcolm, someone makes a playlist and puts all their friends bands on their playlist, and then they make one too, and then one of the playlists actually gets popular. Or sometimes people have access to a venue somewhere close. Like I have a venue here in, in my hometown that is pretty legendary at this point and a lot of of of big US bands have played there in front of just a hundred or 200 people, including bands like Jimmy Eat World for example, in the nineties and stuff like that. So, And we have access to that venue. And we always, we could always organize shows there and invite bands. And so if you have access to something like that, you can invite, you can invite bands that you've met somewhere at a show, at a trade show, at [00:35:00] whatever, whatever community event. You can actually make connections with these bands, invite them to your venue host a show there, whatever. And then, You know, most people will do something for you in return. You don't have to expect it, but maybe they invite you to their venue or maybe they take you on tour, or maybe you don't know what happens from what comes from those types of things, or the other way around maybe they like your music, they have a venue and will invite you or you, you know, these sort of things. So don't just think about how to reach your au a new audience, like directly, but maybe you can. Connect with other musicians who already have an audience or who have something you don't have. And if you partner up, you can combine your superpowers. That's why this is important.

Yeah.

Malcom: Helpful people get helped.

Benedikt: Yes, yes. The reciprocity effect is real. We as humans wanna do that. If something does something good for us we, we feel the need to give something back, hopefully most people, at least in some way, shape or form. So yeah. Then the other way to, to connect is I think just by DMing people. If you see some, some artists, some band or whoever, interesting person you wanna connect with, if you see someone [00:36:00] post interesting stuff online and sometimes they even want you to DM them, I do that all the time too. I post stuff and then I'm like, Hey if you struggle with X, Y, Z or if you have a question about this, or if you have a great, have like, experience with this or have done, if you've done something like that, just the Emmy, I'm, I'm, I'm genuinely interested to hear about that. A lot of people, like most people don't do that. But you can do that. You can just DM me and reach out and we can have a conversation. And you can do that with other people too. So if you see something like that then just do it and reach out to them or you know, be proactive and just start a conversation by sending someone a dm. Not everybody will respond and that's okay too, yet you have to respect that. So don't be. Don't be creepy, of course, but like you, you can't just start conversations online. If that's more comfortable for you, you can comment on other people's posts. So that's even more comfortable for most people. I think if you can just leave a nice comment somewhere you can leave a question, a comment, you can you know, congratulate someone if they've achieved something in a comment or whatever, and maybe they'll get back to you or, and this conversation starts there. You know, that's the easy way to, to start something like that. If you have a hard time leaving [00:37:00] the studio.

Malcom: Yeah, it's a very light touch way of building a relationship. Slowly.

Benedikt: Yeah. And then finally there's what we do right now, you can create content. and then interact with your audience and start conversations there. So if you don't want to reach out directly to anybody, not even in a comment or dm, maybe you can create content. Maybe you can, I don't know. It can be anything. You can do a podcast like we do. You can run a YouTube channel. You can even blog and hope that, I mean, there's successful blogs out there. I don't if people comment or share your blog, you can reach out to them, whatever medium you choose, but you can create some sort of, Social media content, whatever, and build an audience that way. And even if it's a small audience, at some point someone will reach out to you and you can then use that to build a relationship. So that is the other approach. If you are, if you, if there's really no way for you to reach out to people, then maybe make people reach out to you by creating valuable stuff for them. So there's, there's multiple ways to pull that off. What matters is at the end that you make yourself leave your [00:38:00] chair every once in a while and go outside, talk to people. It's good for you as a human. It like it, it, it just feels good and, and it will help you in one way or another. They definitely, definitely, there's no way, it's not gonna help you if.

Malcom: definitely.

Benedikt: yourself with like-minded people, exchange ideas, meet up regularly and just yeah, have that element in your life. It's definitely worth it. And, and you have to remind yourself of that too regularly. Like, because for me, for example, when I transitioned to mixing only and then doing the coaching and courses and that sort of stuff, my life got. A lot lonelier in the beginning. So, because I didn't have bands in the studio anymore, I wasn't on tour with my own band anymore. I was doing remote work only. Then Covid came around of course, and everything got even more lonely. So I, all of a sudden I found myself in a spot where my wife was telling me, Hey, you need to go out more and you need to talk to people again, and you need to have people in your life. You're sitting in the studio all day and then you're home. [00:39:00] And like, you remember when you were out on at shows all the time and, you know, did all these things and I was like, yeah, you're right. I, I probably should do that more. And I have an online community of course, and I do all that, but still, I have to remind myself to, to not forget that and do that again, in a way and, and do that proactively. So, so that's an ongoing thing. I think because it's, it, today, it's so easy to just do everything in front of the computer.

Malcom: Yeah. I, I think most introverts would agree that you, you have that dread of going to the social thing, but once you get there, you're, you're glad you did. You know, it's fun. It's kind of like working out or exercising in any way too. It's just like, I don't want to do this. I , and then you go and you're like, this is great

Benedikt: Yeah,

Malcom: And much like exercise, the more you do it, the easier it gets to remember. And, and not like the, the little speed bump of getting over and actually doing it gets easier and easier. And you just eventually are like, normal.

Benedikt: Yes, 100%. 100%. And just like exercise, as you said, every single time. I haven't [00:40:00] done, I don't remember a single workout where I felt worse after the workout than before. Like even my worst workouts. It was still, after a while, I was still feeling better than before the workout. And it's, it's the same thing with these social things. So, I wanna, I wanna say one thing about the Masterminds because I don't think I'm not sure if any, if everybody's aware of what a Mastermind actually is, because that's also, that's something that's so important for me. So a mastermind basically. And I didn't know that before I was in that business course. So a mastermind is, in our case, like what we do is a group of people that meet regularly and you can, we do it online, we assume, but we also now have had our first in-person meeting after four years. But we meet every single week. And we just, we are all in the music world. Like we are all producers, mixers. There's one acoustician in there, ESCO, you know, him from the podcast, ESCO Lok. But we all are in the music industry in one way or another, and we just help each other out. We ask each other questions about our businesses. We have sort of a hot seat where somebody gets. asked like uncomfortable [00:41:00] questions sometimes, but it really helps that person discover like blind spots in their business and like improve. We also encourage each other. We celebrate our wins together. We just, we just help each other. You could say that we are competitors, but we don't view it that way. We view it as like, we are peers and we wanna, there is enough for everybody and we can help each other out and. This is, this has been super, super helpful for, for us because if you have a group of people who wanna do the same thing and you encounter a problem, Probably one of these other people in the group has already had, had that problem and, and knows how to solve it. So it's almost every single time when I go into our mastermind meeting and I ask a question, some roadblock that I ran into, somebody has an idea on how to solve that. Just the fact that there are four or five brains together who can solve that, you know, that alone is an advantage. But oftentimes somebody has had that problem already. they know the solution. And so in, in your case, it's not a, it might not be a business thing, but it could be just about recording. It could mean, you know, you've never, you've, you're about to record something you've never recorded before, but somebody else in the group [00:42:00] has already done it, and that person can share their experience with you and you can cheer each other on. You can hold each other accountable. That's also pretty cool about our mastermind group because if you say to a group of people that you're gonna do X, Y, Z, you're much more likely to actually do it if those people know about it and hold you accountable. So there's a lot of benefits to that. So if you can form something like that, if you know a couple of like-minded musicians, other bands that you can meet regularly with, like biweekly, weekly, whatever you wanna do, even once a month. And just hold each other accountable. Tell each other about your goals. Tell, tell about like cheer each other on. Celebrate the wins together. Help each other out. Give feedback. You know, share the latest mixes or songs you've written and, and, and give each other feedback on that. That can do a lot for you, and it definitely has for me. And I've been in, it started as a, as an assignment in that business course. So we had to form that mastermind, but we kept it going like now. Four years after this course has ended for us and we still keep it going and meet every week because it's so valuable.

Malcom: That's pretty wild.

Benedikt: Yeah, [00:43:00] yeah,

Malcom: Yeah, I think we've made a pretty compelling case for, for the importance of networking and, and getting out into your musical, musical community. I, I think it's pretty hard to deny after an episode like this,

Benedikt: Oh yeah.

Malcom: wanna be a lone soldier,

Benedikt: No, you don't. Definitely not. Yeah. Yeah, I think, I don't, I can't think of anything else to add to this. I think this was, this was really I think we, yeah, done

Malcom: Just I think some final calls to action join our Facebook community because if you haven't, and you're listening to this, it's like, what? , that's obvious. Do that. Do hit us up with your questions on Instagram. That's another thing that I'm gonna be disappointed if you don't do after listening to this for like 40 minutes or whatever we've been recording for it's so, so yeah, take implement. You know, it's one thing to listen to us and it sounds like you're having a conversation with us, but we can't hear you, so you gotta, you know, it's a two-way street,

Benedikt: Absolutely, and, and we give you multiple opportunities [00:44:00] actually there that you can, you can take advantage of. You can join that completely free Facebook community. You can download one of our free things that we create for you that are actually valuable in and of themselves, but it also will lead to. you being on our email list. And so we will reach out to you via email, and in those emails I ask people to reply to the emails and ask me questions or give me more info about them and what they're struggling with so I can help 'em better. So there's another call to action for people to, to get in touch with me. And ask questions and, and share more about themselves so I can serve them. So there's that. Then you can book a completely free call with me, a one-on-one coaching call, and I will sit down for an hour with you personally and listen to your music and give you advice and feedback and show you like a step-by-step action plan that you can then go implement on your own or together with me in the coaching program. So there's another opportunity for you. There are our courses with things like the meetup that we do today. So there's multiple ways. That you can actually like, use right now and implement that, that stuff, right. And

Malcom: Mm-hmm.[00:45:00]

Benedikt: and yeah, and to answer your question in the beginning, Malcolm, because you, you were asking about whether or not mixes, unpacked will be available again. So what we're gonna be doing in the future. Is I'm gonna focus, like the main focus is on our core thing that we offer, which is the self recording syndicate. That is the coaching program that gives people the, the best like sustainable, like long-term results, basically because it's just it's a long in-depth one-on-one program. So that's gonna be our main offer. And if you're in there, you get access to all our courses that we have. That's part of the co of the, the program. But we are also gonna be Offering our courses in the future. Again, there's just gonna be some different bundles and different options available in the new year. But yeah, there will be access again to these courses in one way or another. And if you wanna know about that, the best way to not miss that is to be on our email list, because then we will let you know for sure. We'll also let you know on the podcast, I think, but the email list is the best place for that really. But yeah, we're gonna open up the doors again and. If you're in any of our programs, there's always an opportunity to reach out. There's always some sort of community element, there's [00:46:00] always some sort of meetup or something, or you know it's, it, it's a part of it because we really believe in this and we really believe that you shouldn't just try it on your own. So yeah, there's that. I can't, I can't tell

Malcom: Absolutely.

Benedikt: like, but we are definitely gonna open the doors again to mixes, unpack.

Malcom: Great. Great. Yeah. Thanks so much for listening. As always. It's it's always a blast. And next episode, big one 50

Benedikt: Exactly, . Awesome. Thank you for listening to you in episode one 15 next week. Bye-bye.

Malcom: Bye.

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